The bodies continue to wash up. But the morgues have already run out of room.
Since the catastrophic floods tore through the Himalayan valleys of Nepal and Tibet, the death count has continued to climb relentlessly. Hundreds of bodies have resurfaced, pulled from the thick, tar-like mud that smothered everything in the wake of the receding floodwaters. By Sunday, the official death toll in Nepal and Tibet had reached 797.
Morgues across Nepal are overflowing. Authorities report being overwhelmed by the grim task of identifying the dead—many of whom are mangled beyond recognition and have been discovered miles from their homes. As safe storage spaces for the victims are exhausted, mass burials have commenced in the district of Bharatpur.
DNA samples were collected from each body before it was assigned a tag and a location number, sealed in a plastic bag, and placed in a shallow grave. According to the police, the hope is that these remains will eventually be identified by loved ones through DNA matching and retrieved for proper funeral rites.
In Chitwan, located roughly 100 miles downstream from the region hardest hit by the flash floods and mudslides, more than 250 bodies have washed ashore along the riverbanks. However, they are in such a disfigured state that only nine have been successfully identified. Many of the unidentified victims will now be interred, at least temporarily, in a forested area on the outskirts of the city.
In an effort to accelerate the identification process, local officials have resorted to a grim method: asking families to review photographs of the bodies and search for recognizable features such as a necklace, a wedding ring, a tattoo, or a scar. Images of the recovered victims have been compiled into PowerPoint slideshows for relatives to review patiently and have also been uploaded to the Nepal police website. Outside the morgue in Kathmandu, photographs of the deceased have been displayed on the walls.
With more than 3,000 people still reported missing in Nepal and Tibet, there are growing fears that the death toll could rise exponentially. Many of the worst-affected areas—where entire villages were obliterated by the apocalyptic wave of mud, water, and debris—remain accessible only by military helicopter. Speaking on Sunday, Foreign Secretary Amrit Bahadur Rai announced that the government had requested “more than 1,000 freezer units” for the safe storage of the deceased.
Even in downstream areas that were devastated by the floods but remain accessible by road, search and rescue teams have faced immense challenges in recovering all the victims buried in the mud. On Sunday afternoon in Devighat, a sacred town on the Trishuli River that was reduced to ruins by the floods, police search and rescue teams prepared to extract another victim from the muddy wreckage of a house. Only the feet were discernible through the thick sludge.
“It is very tough work. We have retrieved 10 bodies from here so far, maybe there will be more,” said Amabadutta Bhatta, a police superintendent involved in search and rescue operations. “The floods destroyed the first and second storeys of most homes here. When we finally clear all the mud, which may take many months, who knows what we might find.”
Survivors of the floods in Devighat have slowly begun returning to witness the remnants of their homes, many of which were completely washed away. Standing beside the carcass of her house—reduced to a few concrete blocks and twisted metal—Usha Nepali, 49, wept for the home where she had raised her four children and later her three grandchildren.
“I invested everything to build this house, so now I don’t know where to go and what to do,” Nepali said. “Nothing is left except this cloth on my back. I haven’t even been able to change clothes since the floods. How can we rebuild this house? This land is no longer safe, but it’s the only land we have. The river has taken everything.”
The precariousness of life alongside the Trishuli River was underscored on Sunday as the fast-moving waters again rose to dangerous levels, prompting rescuers to urge residents to seek higher ground immediately. Many in Devighat were hastily packing up the few belongings they could salvage from their homes, preparing to leave for good.
Jamuna Magar, 36, shared that her husband’s family had resided in Devighat for generations. She came to the town after her marriage and remembered it fondly as “such a beautiful place.”
In the moments after receiving the flood warning, she had managed to grab her gold but nothing else. Standing amid the ruins of her house, clutching the only item she had been able to retrieve so far—a plastic vat of vegetable cooking oil—she expressed doubt about ever being able to live in Devighat again.
“We had experienced flooding before, but we never knew a flood like this could come and take our house,” she said. “Everything we owned was on the ground floor of the house, and now it’s all lost. Even our refrigerator washed away. I’m too worried about my life, about my children’s lives, to stay here any longer.”
She feared it would take “decades before they can rebuild Devighat again.”
